Christmas pudding | Jamie Oliver Christmas recipes (2024)

FAQs

What is the item hidden in Christmas pudding? ›

It was common practice to include small silver coins in the pudding mixture, which could be kept by the person whose serving included them. The usual choice was a silver threepence or a sixpence.

A silver sixpence was placed into the pudding mix and every member of the household gave the mix a stir. Whoever found the sixpence in their own piece of the pudding on Christmas Day would see it as a sign that they would enjoy wealth and good luck in the year to come.

The Christmas Pudding Today

In half a minute Mrs. Cratchit entered: flushed, but smiling proudly: with the pudding, like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.

Christmas Pudding (also known as plum pudding or figgy pudding) is a dish as famous as it is misunderstood. In America, Christmas Pudding (also known as plum pudding or figgy pudding) is a dish as famous as it is misunderstood.

Finding a Christmas coin in your slice of pudding is believed to bring good luck and especially wealth in the coming year. This lovely tradition may date back as early as the 1300s when a dried pea or sometimes a small silver ring or crown was baked into a Twelfth Night Cake.

Superstitions say that Christmas pudding must be prepared with 13 ingredients, which are said to represent Jesus and his twelve disciples. It is also said that the mixture should be stirred in turn from east to west, by each family member, to honour the disciples' journey.

A Christmas pudding should have 13 ingredients – that represent Jesus and the 12 disciples. Traditionally, these ingredients include: raisins, currants, suet, brown sugar, breadcrumbs, citron, lemon peel, orange peel, flour, mixed spices, eggs, milk and brandy.

Why Is It Called Figgy Pudding? The 'pudding' part of the name makes it a dessert in Britain, but not the custardy type of dish most Americans would associate with the word. At some point the dish included figs, lending itself to the term of 'figgy' as part of a Christmas pudding recipe.

Religious significance

It is believed that a Christmas pudding must contain thirteen ingredients. These ingredients each represent Jesus and each of his twelve disciples. Traditionally, brandy is poured over the Christmas pudding and set aflame before serving. The flames are believed to represent Christ's passion.

Why do people put money in Christmas pudding? ›

It is key that every member of the family gives the pudding mixture a stir and makes a wish at the same time. Traditionally, a silver sixpence was stirred in to bring whoever found the coin on Christmas Day wealth and good luck in the year to come.

This ritual was also thought to bring the family luck in the coming year. Originally the puddings would have been shaped into a sphere and boiled in a cloth. This practice eventually gave way to steaming the dessert in a pudding basin or elaborate mould, particularly in wealthier households.

Diamond fruitcake – $1,650,000 ($ 1.65 million) World's Most Expensive Desserts - Diamond Fruitcake Sold on Christmas 2005, this cake was also created by a Japanese pastry chef. Creating the cake required six months of conceptualization and another month to produce it. It's decorated with 223 diamonds.

LillyPuds Great Taste award winning Christmas pudding produced with the finest vine fruits, apples, apricots, almonds and ginger blended with brandy and Brentwood Brewing Company Chockwork Orange beer.

The tinned pudding is believed to be one of the oldest in the world. A 120-year-old Christmas pudding given to Royal Navy sailors fighting in the Boer War has gone on display.

These charms, among others, are a donkey, a little duck, piggie, belle (a bell), imp and spoon. A special set of plum pudding and cake jewellery for lucky charms includes a swastika (long life), bell (marriage), coin (fortune yours), piggie (good luck), bogey man (be happy) and lucky shoe.

What is traditionally hidden inside a Christmas pudding? The most popular thing to hide in a Christmas pudding is a silver coin, which if found is meant to bring the recipient good luck (although a few broken tooth anecdotes might say otherwise) for the next year.

If you're old enough you will remember Christmas puddings containing coins that were said to bring the finder good luck. Before coins, charms were put inside Christmas puddings including a silver coin for wealth, a wishbone for luck, a thimble for thrift, a ring for marriage and an anchor for safe harbour.